For A Long Healthy Life: Miso & Blood Vessel

​Miso is good for the blood vessel.
 
Miso soup seems like containing a lot of salt and not being good for the blood vessel, but the amount of salt contained in a cup of miso soup is only 1.4 grams on average.
 
Peptide contained in miso lowers blood pressure and protects the blood vessel.
 
In a study using a mouse with high blood pressure, the blood pressure of the mouse started going down 6 hours after extract of miso was injected to the mouse. It has turned out that peptide contained in miso inhibits the function of enzyme that elevates blood pressure.
 
Therefore, because the effect of peptide is stronger than the effect of salt, drinking miso soup doesn’t elevate blood pressure.
 
There is no relation between the consumption of miso and the elevation of blood pressure.
 
Red miso keeps blood vessels young
 
The substance of the color of red miso has the power to suppress the absorption of sugar.
 
The substance of the color of red miso called melanoidin suppresses the absorption of sugar in the intestine and slows down the elevation of blood sugar after meals.
 
The more aged the red miso is, the more melanoidin is contained and is more effective.
 
What ingredient for miso soup is effective to lower blood pressure?
 
That is Wakame.
 
Wakame is rich in potassium that excretes salt from the body with urine so wakame is expected to lower blood pressure.
 
If your blood pressure is high, adding Tofu as another ingredient is more effective because Tofu is made of soy beans and also contains soy peptide (Fig. 1).
 
When should miso be added to the soup?
 
5 minutes after shutting off the heat.
 
Miso is fermented food containing koji mold, lactic acid bacteria and a yeast fungus, but they will die if boiled. 5 minutes after shutting off the heat, the temperature of the soup becomes about 50 degrees C (122 degrees F). If you add miso at this timing, living bacteria can reach the intestine.
 
Even if you boil soup with miso, dead bacteria can be feed of intestinal bacteria.